Gerald Ford, Unsentimentally (MATTHEW ROTHSCHILD)

[laststeamtrain]

Gerald Ford, Unsentimentally
By Matthew Rothschild


Sorry, but I refuse to let my tear ducts open over the death of Gerald Ford.

There’s something profoundly undemocratic and vaguely medieval about the almost mandatory salutes that we, the people, are supposed to offer when a former President dies.

The niceties of custom all too often reinforce the habits of blind obedience to the unworthy wielders of power.

Say no ill of the dead, we are told.

Hogwash. Let’s look at Gerald Ford’s record.

The first thing he did was to pardon Richard Nixon, even though ten days previously he had said that the special prosecutor should proceed against “any and all individuals” and a year before, he averred that “I do not think the public would stand for it.”

The pardon short-circuited the necessary prosecution of Nixon, which would have served as a salutary check on future inhabitants of the Oval Office. Instead, the pardon set a precedent for such flagrant lawbreakers as we have in the White House today.

If impeachment of Bush and Cheney may be just a remote possibility, prosecution and incarceration remain inconceivable. And so Bush and Cheney, thanks to Ford, can float comfortably above the law.

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http://progressive.org/mag_wx122706
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I didn't see this anywhere on DU. Rothschild was on Rachel Madow yesterday eve & was a good guest.

[Eric J in MN]

1. "the pardon set a precedent for such flagrant lawbreakers as..." Bush.

I agree.

[Warren Stupidity]

2. K&R

Good essay. Sums up the case on Ford. No bashing, no hate, just the facts ma'am.

[phillysuse]

3. Gerald Ford also set precedents

in going after William O Douglas for supporting the publication of the Pentagon Papers.
He was a master of the smear - smearing Douglas as a Communist and then smearing him because of his marital history. He tried to impeach Douglas for this, laying the groundwork for Gingrich and Starr.

By pardoning Nixon, he set a precedent that put the President above the Constitution.

On Tuesday, we should mourn for the holes he helped tear in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.

And above all, he gave Don Rumseld and Dick Cheney jobs and gave them a start on their destructive paths.